A Fall Classic

One of the things I enjoy most about kayaking is that you can paddle the same route hundreds of times and it always different.
Today I paddled the Pier 5 to Harbor of Refuge route again. When H, TM, and I did this route earlier in the season it challenged us. The swells were big, pushy, and constant. There were breaking waves along most of the route and we surfed into the harbor. The winds had a chill and the skies threatened rain.
Today the ocean was calm. The wind was warm. The skies were sunny. It was perfect late summer conditions.
I could really stretch out and cruise. There was a slight cross wind pushing the Q's stern around, so I also got a chance to work on effective corrective strokes. I would slip a stern rudder onto the end of a stroke occasionally. I'd just let the blade linger at the end of the stroke. I also tried to incorporate the stern draw. The stern draw is finicky. Sometimes I would catch the wrong face of the paddle. Sometimes the stern wouldn't move. Sometimes the stern would move, but not enough to straighten the kayak. Sometimes the whole kayak would draw to the side. On very few occasions did it actually work properly. I need to keep practicing.
While playing in the rocks and rough conditions is exciting, sometime a nice open water run is perfect. It lets me blow the carbon out of the cylinders.

Letting the Wind Pass

Now that the high season for power boating has passed, it is a great time to kayak in Boston Harbor. The weather and water is still warm and the number of boats clogging the channels is manageable.
I was going to lead a RICKA paddle to the outer islands yesterday. I was excited to share one of my local resources with my RI friends. Sadly, the wind forecast was extreme. 15 to 20 in the outer harbor is a little rough, but 30 knt gusts are crazy. So, I decided to cancel the paddle.
Fortunately, the winds were forecasted to die over night. 5 knt winds are perfect for a late fall paddle. So, I decided to reschedule the paddle for today.
The morning was bright, but chilly. The day was looking like a great day to paddle.
The only anxiety was about who would show up for the paddle. I knew most of the regular crew would not show up. They all had other commitments. The absolute worst that could happen was the H and I would have to enjoy the water by ourselves. You know life is good when the absolute worst outcome is spending the day paddling with your favorite person.
On the way to Hull we spotted at least two familiar kayaks. Once at the put-in we discovered six more paddlers. There were two familiar faces, two faces I hadn't seen in a long time, and four new faces. The group seemed to gel before we even got on the water.
The plan for the day was to paddle out to Little Brewster and check out the light house. Then we'd island hop over to Green Island for lunch. After lunch, we'd island hop over to Georges Island to check out Ft. Warren. Then we'd return to Hull.
This was a great plan based on us launching at mid-tide on an out going tide. Sadly, I'd gotten the tides backwards. We'd have the currents against us all day.
To make the crossing to the light house we paddled out to Allerton Point. From there we crossed the channel on a steep ferry angle. The incoming tide pushed us down the channel as we aimed our kayaks out of the harbor. We managed to pick the perfect angle and ended up along Little Brewster. We landed to take a tour of the light house, but it is being repaired. We were allowed to walk the grounds. It was a quick tour because the tide was raising fast. We didn't have much time before our kayaks were heading to Green Island without us.
We got to Green about 40 minutes before high tide. We paddled the island looking for the beach to land and have lunch. I knew it was there because I had lunched there this past winter... We must have landed there closer to low tide in Febuary because the beach was a tiny patch of rocks.
The best we could find for lunch was a disappearing pile of rocks between Green and Little Calf. We had an authentic sea kayaking lunch hunkered down watching the tide wash over our beach.
After lunch, we paddled over to Georges Island. Crossing the channel was exciting. There was a surprising amount of boat traffic.
At Georges Island, we took an extended break. Some people explored the fort, some people napped, and some just hung out on the beach.
From Georges Island, we made our way back to Hull. We had a long channel crossing and the Hull Gut to contend with before we were home. The current was against us and running at full strength.
For the crossing, the current was no big deal. However, the Gut was a challenge. The current was stacking up with a row of standing waves. These were confused by the boat traffic plying the Gut. Sticking close to shore would keep us out of the worst of the current. Sadly, none of us stayed close to shore. H nearly went over. I got spun around once. It was a lot of fun.
Despite the less than ideal planning, we had a nice time. The weather was perfect and the group was excellent. It goes to show that waiting a day for the wind to blow over is a good idea.

Sunday on the Water

After some confusion about if there was going to be a paddle on the weekend, TM finally settled things by coordinating a paddle out of Wickford. His plan was a long trip that would appeal to level two paddlers.
The day started out a little chilly, but got progressively warmer. The wind was minimal. It was idyllic late summer weather.
We paddled down past the Jamestown Bridge and had lunch on Dutch Island. Then paddled back to Wickford with a quick detour into the bay behind Rome Point.
I did get a chance to play with some different paddles. I tried out RB's Werner paddle. It is very nice, but it foiled me in rolling. I managed a roll on one side, but not the other. TM seems to think that it is just that I'm not used to the blade shape....
I think TM is just trying to make me feel better.
It was a great chance to spend some time on the water with just the expectation of relaxing.

Banging Around for Labour Day

H, PB, and I wanted to do a camping trip in Maine before the warm weather ended. We tried to get something together last weekend, but the weather and schedules didn't corporate. Since this weekend was a three day end of summer celebration and the forecast was reasonable, we managed to get something together.
It was a small group since a number of people had other plans. It included PB, EB, H, and myself.
Since H already had Friday off from work, she decided that the plan would be to turn our three day weekend into a Friday through Sunday affair. We would miss most of the traffic and still have a day off from work to lounge about the house and clean off our camping gear.
Friday morning didn't start off with a bang. H and I had troubles getting our acts in gear. Everything just took longer than we anticipated. We also had to make an unplanned stop at West Marine to try and order a new battery for my VHF. The connectors on the current battery corroded to the point where one of them just fell off. Even the West Marine stop took forever. It seems that West Marine does not carry spare batteries, or the AA battery pack accessory, for the VHF radios they sell. They can, however, special order them. The very nice kid at the desk took the special order, but was either new or "special" orders are so special they are rarely executed....
Once on the road we made excellent time to the put in at Dolphin Marina in Harpswell, ME. PB and EB were there well ahead of us since they had gotten on the road at the planned time. We didn't hold the show up too long though. H and I made quick work of getting the kayaks loaded.
We had discussed several possible islands for camping including Whaleboat, Bangs, and possibly Jewel. Our first choice was the camp site on the NE tip of Bangs. It has views of both sunrise and sunset, a sandy (for ME) beach for the kayaks and fires, and flat tent spots. All of the options, except for Jewell, were short paddles so we figured that we would go for the first choice and if we got skunked we could easily find another decent spot before dark.
To our delight, our first choice was available. We set up camp and immediately settled into island time. PB set out to collect fire wood. The rest of us sort of wandered about gazing at the scenery and moving towards dinner. Our eventual dinner was quite nice.
Eventually, we got our acts together enough to go on a moonlight paddle. The full moon spread silvery light over the landscape. We hardly needed extra lights. The moonlit island and water was lovely. We saw a heron that sat in place as we paddled by at a very close distance. The landscape was so transformed that we paddled right by our beach the first time.
On the way back, I decided to be cute and paddle backwards. As H chastised me, and I joked about how it doesn't matter that I was paddling backwards since I could see anyway, I backed onto a rock.... Fortunately, the keel strip took the brunt of the contact.
Once back at the campsite we got a fire going. The rest of the evening was spent basking in the glow of fire and friendly conversation.
The only tension was the slow march of water towards the fire. When the water finally snuffed the fire, we headed to our tents.
Saturday broke sunny and fresh. We again spent a good part of the morning meandering around. We eventually decided on an excursion to Admiral Peary's Eagle Island. The island is a Maine Historical Site. The original house has been turned into a museum and the grounds have been preserved for public viewing. The house is well preserved and full of interesting relics. One strange thing is that they make visitors put on plastic booties before entering the house. According to the caretakers, the booties keeps the salt on people's shoes from corroding the floor planks.
After Eagle Island we started over to Whaleboat Island to check out the campsites. The current and the wind were against us on the crossing. At first we didn't really notice how strong the current was working against us. The lobster buoys were sitting straight in the water, so there were no visual clues. Eventually, however, the current took its toll on our strength. We decided to abandon our push to Whaleboat and retreat back to the comfort of camp.
We spent our second night at camp the same way we spent our first. Sitting around a fire. Instead of doing a moonlight paddle, we watched as the tide slowly lifted a grounded sailboat out of its muddy trap. Actually, the real show was the stream of boats that motored out the sailboat, circled it, and returned home.
On our final morning, we did a quick search for the campsites on the opposite side of Bangs Island from ours. We scoured the coast from our kayaks for sign of them. We even checked the shore line by foot for signs, but found very little. There was a nice beach and a number of cairns marking the spot where the camp sites should have been. However, we couldn't find anything that looked like a tent site on the shore and there were no obvious paths into the woods.
After a quick lunch and repacking our kayaks, we decided to head home via Whaleboat island. We really wanted to find the campsites on that island for future trips. This time we were successful. The first set of sites we found are in the woods of the western shore of the island. They have a nice beach and plenty of shelter. We considered, briefly, extending our trip for a day and staying the night here. Sadly, we couldn't muster the energy to unpack the kayaks and reestablish camp.
So we headed back to Dolphin Marina. On the crossing from Whaleboat to South Harpswell, the water can play little tricks on your vision. The passage between the point of South Harpswell and the islands off of it can be hard to judge. I knew roughly where it was and headed straight for it. The rest of the group decided to trust their eyes and took a wider course. We never lost sight of each other, but it was fun watching them paddle out to sea for a while before realizing that I knew what I was doing.
It was a great weekend. As PB mentioned on the paddle home, the islands in Casco Bay are treasures that need to be preserved.

RICKA BBQ

We had the RICKA BBQ today.
In the past RICKA would have a holiday party as an annual gathering. It was a good time, but there is something off about a bunch of kayakers dressed all pretty having a sit down meal in the middle of the winter.
This year it was decided that a BBQ in the summer would be a more natural fit. I think it was a smashing success. There were paddles that went out in the morning. One trip went out to the mouth of the Bay. Another trip went around Dutch Island.
After the kayaking, we had a great BBQ meal at the Fort Getty Pavilion. After food, there was a brief awards ceremony and plenty of lawn golf.
The people who coordinated the event did a great job putting it all together. I cannot wait until next year's outing.